The present invention relates to the deformation of activation targets associated with items displayed on touch screen devices using accelerometer or gyroscope information in such devices, and more particularly, to deforming keyboard activation targets using accelerometer or gyroscope information in such devices.
Touch screen devices such as smartphones and tablets are used in places and situations where laptops are not traditionally used. Since smartphones and tablets present small virtual keyboards on their display screen to the user for input, many techniques have been developed which help a user enter text with minimal mistakes.
FIG. 1 shows an example of one such technique, in which when a user taps keys on a virtual keyboard, the activation target for a particular key is extended beyond the pixel boundaries for the particular key being drawn on the display screen. For example, when typing “hello”, after the user has typed “hell”, the following letter is much more likely to be “o” than “p”, and so the activation target 102 for the letter “o” is expanded, into the “p” key region. In the example of FIG. 1, only the activation target 102 changes, the keys displayed on the screen do not change in shape or size.
However, techniques such as that shown in FIG. 1 do not solve all the problems associated with helping a user enter text with minimal mistakes. As an example, when a user is using a virtual keyboard while lying on their side, the user tends to allow their thumbs when typing to be pulled down a little more than otherwise, towards the floor, thus applying a slight offset to the thumb placement on the keys. This leads to spelling mistakes and a poor user experience.